Taylor AB-1,2, and 3

[azslacker]

Anybody ever played, or even seen  a Taylor acoustic bass. Made from around 1996-2003. Ran across one on Craigslist Phoenix. Pretty cool looking.

[Gutch]

I owned an AB-3 several years back.  Beautiful instruments, well built as you would expect.  Big instrument -- Best (and most accurate) description I've ever heard: "It's like hanging a Buick around your neck."  Acoustically, the AB series is surprisingly quiet for its size.  Pickup system is good, though.

For the Taylor collection, it's a neat find.  As a working addition to the performance arsenal, I found it very limited.  As always, YMMV...

[Earl]

I played a few on occasion in a store back in those days, but never considered buying one.  They were large, acoustically quiet and rather costly (on par with the 814's of their day).  They were also visually quite neat - somewhat avant gard in design - and played well, like any Taylor.  It is hard to get an acceptable acoustic-only bass sound / loudness with the fairly tiny internal volume (cubic feet) of an acoustic guitar versus a doghouse bass.  I don't that any builder has really accomplished unamplified volume in a guitar shaped package.

Sometimes we forget that not everything Taylor does is a home run in the marketplace.  They didn't make all that many of them in total.  If you can add one to your collection for a reasonable cost, and are interested, then go for it.  You will have a cool piece of history and an unusual acoustic bass to play.